ANALYSIS - India, Pakistan banish strife with dream final

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India and Pakistan set up a dream final at the Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa on Saturday, six months after their ignominious first-round exits from the 50-over version in West Indies.

India stunned Australia, champions in tests and one-dayers, by 15 runs after Pakistan's six-wicket win over New Zealand in the first semi, sending passionate sub-continent cricket fans into frenzied celebration anticipating Monday's final.
Both began as rank outsiders in the inaugural World Cup for the game's shortest and newest version, but have banished their Caribbean failure as a distant nightmare.
India aim for a repeat of their 1983 World Cup win while Pakistan, the 1992 champions, have yet to beat their traditional rivals in a Cup encounter. Their meeting in the early stages ended with India winning a 'bowl out' after a tied game.
With the average age of their players below 24, India beat England, South Africa and Australia in must-win games, vindicating the selectors' decision to groom them for the future.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni was named captain after Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly opted out and the wicketkeeper is moulding the team in his mirror image, flamboyant but committed to the team's cause.
RELUCTANT ENTRANTS
The Indian board had only reluctantly agreed to send a team, having initially argued Twenty20 was new at domestic level and worried it could overshadow the lucrative one-day version in the game's commercial hub.
During the Super Eights stage of the tournament, left-handed batsman Yuvraj Singh became only the fourth batsman in elite cricket to hit six sixes in an over, against England, and also smashed 70 off 30 deliveries against Australia.
India's achievement has been especially remarkable as they do not have a coach, with the board still looking for a replacement since Australian Greg Chappell quit in April.
The Twenty20 mania sweeping through India has also been stoked by a multi-million dollar franchise league announced by the board to counter a rebel league.
Pakistan's unbeaten run, barring the bowl out against India, has finally brought smiles to the faces of their fans, in despair since their Caribbean debacle and coach Bob Woolmer's death.
Woolmer's death in Jamaica -- which occurred a day after Pakistan was eliminated from the World Cup -- was initially investigated as a murder until authorities concluded it was due to natural causes.
Former captain Inzamam-ul Haq and batting mainstay Mohammad Yousuf then caused more strife by joining the rebel Indian Twenty20 league despite the board threatening to ban them.
Controversial strike bowler Shoaib Akhtar was then sent home from South Africa after he struck team mate Mohammad Asif with a bat in a training ground bust up.
Despite the distractions, Shoaib Malik has led from the front with his batting where unfancied Misbah-ul Haq has provided depth. Shahid Afridi has shone as a spinner rather than as an explosive batsman.
Organisers are now assured of a packed stadium with millions of fans sure to watch the game on television across the globe.
Former India skipper Kapil Dev summed up the mood in the sub-continent.
"I can say in the coming days, Twenty20 will become the most exciting format of the game," he said on television.

U.N., AU differ on composition of Darfur peace force

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Not enough countries have contributed to the peacekeeping force in Darfur and the African Union is blocking some of those who have, diplomats said on the eve of a high-level meeting on Sudan on Friday.

Ministers or their deputies from 26 countries have been invited to the late Friday session, chaired by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and African Union Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare to analyze U.N.-A.U. plans for a joint force in Darfur, energize peace talks and expand aid to more than 2 million people expelled from their homes.
Jean-Marie Guehenno, the U.N. undersecretary-general for peacekeeping, said earlier this week the force still needs specialized helicopter, transport and logistical units.
While African nations have offered enough infantry troops for the force of up to 26,000 troops and police, some of them are without proper equipment.
Consequently U.N. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that soldiers would have to be found from other nations. But Konare had raised objections to some units, including those offered by Norway, Uruguay and Thailand.
Touching on the conflict, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters, "We understand that the character of the force has to be African but (it's) a UN-AU force," with U.N. member states footing the bill.
"It has been understood from the beginning that there will be complementary non-African forces and capabilities available to complement the predominantly African character" of the force," Khalilzad said.
"But I think right now the African Union secretariat needs to move," he added.
HUMANITARIAN CRISES
The agenda also includes a report from U.N. and A.U, mediators of peace talks between the Sudan government and rebel groups, scheduled for Libya on October 27 in hopes of a cease-fire before the planned force is fully deployed.
The peace conference would seek to end a conflict that has generated one of the world's worst humanitarian crises and sparked U.S. accusations -- dismissed by Sudan -- of genocide. Much of the killing, rape and looting has been blamed on a government-allied militia known as the Janjaweed.
International experts estimate some 200,000 people have died and over 2.5 million have been made homeless in Darfur since an uprising against alleged government neglect of the region flared in 2003. Khartoum puts the death toll at 9,000.
But one item not on the agenda is how to get Sudan to turn over two men charged by the International Court with war crimes and crimes against humanity. Khartoum has refused to do so.
"I am concerned that the silence by most states and international organizations on the subject of the arrest warrants has been understood in Khartoum as a weakening of international resolve," Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the court's prosecutor told a news conference on Thursday.
"Justice in Darfur must be on the agenda, at the top of the agenda," he said, adding that one of those charged, Ahmad Harun, was now senior official for humanitarian affairs.
"As peace talks and negotiations for the deployment of the hybrid force advance, there is a resurgence of violence around the camp," Moreno-Ocampo said. "I have reasons to believe that it is an operation in which Ahmad Harun plays a key role."

Opposition wins Sierra Leone presidency

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone - Opposition leader Ernest Bai Koroma was sworn in as Sierra Leone's president Monday and vowed to adopt zero tolerance on corruption, after officials declared him the winner of a tense run-off election.

In choosing Koroma, the battle-weary citizens of this West African country voted against the party that ushered them out of a devastating war in 2002 and for the promise of a better peace with less corruption and more jobs.
Hours after the swearing-in ceremony, hundreds of looters descended on the headquarters of the former president's party. They carried out desks and chairs, computer monitors and printers, posters and coat racks before police blanketed the neighborhood with tear gas.
Police also fired bullets into the air and arrested numerous people while regaining control of the area. At least one person was killed, according to footage taken by an Associated Press Television News cameraman at the scene.
Koroma was sworn in after election officials declared him the winner with 55 percent of 1.7 million ballots cast, compared with 45 percent for the ruling party candidate, Vice President Solomon Berewa.
"I inherited a bankrupt, war-torn and failing state. Today, I am handing over to you a fully stable and functional state," outgoing president Ahmed Tejan Kabbah told Koroma in front of a crowd of cheering and clapping supporters.
Thousands of Koroma's supporters wearing red T-shirts and hats clogged the streets of the capital city of Freetown, singing and dancing through a heavy midday downpour.
Although ruling party officials had earlier decried the outcome on local radio, Berewa said he called Koroma with congratulations soon after the release of the results.
Both parties had complained of localized fraud and misconduct at some polling stations, but international observers said the poll went off generally smoothly and without major problems that would have invalidated the outcome.
The election, the first presidential vote since U.N. peacekeepers withdrew two years ago, was seen as a test of whether the West African country has emerged from the chaos wrought by a decade-long war. Tens of thousands of civilians died in the fighting, and rebels hacked off the limbs of countless others.
Peace was re-established in diamond-rich Sierra Leone with the help of U.N. forces in 2002, but most of its residents remain poor and unemployed, and corruption is rampant.
Koroma, 54, promised to root out corruption and create economic opportunities. A former insurance company executive, he also promised to run the government with the efficiency of a business, quickly rebuilding roads and infrastructure.
"My government will spare no effort to adopt zero tolerance on corruption and mismanagement of state resources. We know how high your expectations are and that you have suffered for too long," Koroma told the crowd of military officials, dignitaries and supporters at the ceremony.
Alieu Mansaray, an accountant and Koroma supporter, said in Freetown that he was looking forward "to having good roads, regular electricity and water supply, quality and affordable education for our children."
About 2.6 million of Sierra Leone's 5 million people registered to vote in the election. Kabbah was barred by term limits from running for a third five-year term.
The governing party candidate was considered the front-runner before the first round of voting on Aug. 11. But Koroma won 44 percent of the vote in the first round, compared with 38 percent for Berewa. The margin was not large enough for him to win outright, forcing a runoff.
Koroma's win solidifies the return of his All People's Congress to power for the first time since being ousted in a 1992 coup. The APC also won the majority of legislative seats in last month's vote.
Some in the country still see the party that ruled Sierra Leone from 1967 to 1992 as symbolic of the strong-arm statesmanship that helped foment discontent and fuel rebellion. The APC instituted a one-party state in 1978, banning all other political parties for more than a decade until shortly before it was overthrown.
The coup was led by a group of young military officers who promised to rein in abuses of power and put down a growing rebellion in the east. Instead, the fighting worsened and Sierra Leone was plunged into years of civil war.
U.N. and British forces defeated the rebellion, and a U.N. force stayed on, swelling to 17,500 troops before departing in December 2005. British troops have helped train a new 17,500-strong army, which, together with 9,500 police, is responsible for national security.